


Defining Love

by MaggieWilde8



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: F/M, Friendship/Love, Interspecies Relationship(s), Love, Love Confessions, Maybe - Freeform, One Shot, Romance, Unrequited Love, could be more, i think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 06:24:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14514435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaggieWilde8/pseuds/MaggieWilde8





	Defining Love

** 6 months earlier **

 

The sky gleamed with the hardness of blue enamel.

I knew it wasn’t really a sky – it was all technologically generated, but briefly I imagined it was. The sloping white architecture did its best to mimic the Citadel’s own, but it didn’t invoke any sort of wistful longing; I’d grown up in a slum back on Earth. Slums exist on the Citadel, I knew that much, but it always seemed so unbelievable. The most advanced space station, the hub of galactic civilisation, and it had seedy, slummy wards? My eyes drifted to the glittering lakes and I fleetingly considered diving into that oh-so blue water. I needed some _fun_ , something to wake myself up with. I felt the ache in my six-hundred-year-old bones, the nausea threatening the back of my throat. Suddenly my omni tool bleeped.

_You’re late._

“Bollocks!” I hissed and moved from the balcony I’d been leaning against.

I darted towards the elevator, seeing people pass me confused looks. I tried to not imagine the look on my teacher’s face, but it shoved its way into my head without permission. His normally large eyes would be squinted, his thin mouth pursed, tall slender body standing straight with arms behind his back. My white trainers skidded on the floor as I entered the elevator, and I rocked on the balls of my feet wishing the damn monorail could get to my destination faster. I thought up of all sorts of excuses as I bounced; other colleagues’ requests, feeling ill (the cryo-stasis sickness was getting old now, though), getting lost (losing that one too) or preoccupied with work…that one could work. He’d love me for that – if I could make up some bullshit about being absorbed in a little homemade project (to do with plants of course) he’d forgive and forget all in one smooth minute.

Unfortunately, my teacher was salarian – forgetting was not what he did. In that instant I realised that making up an excuse was something he’d see through in an instant – and he’d challenge me for every one I had made up. Half skipping, half jumping towards class, I smiled at the challenge I’d given myself. We were on the labs floor – the main floor for all laboratories, classrooms and research rooms. His little sanctum. When the door flushed open, revealing the class in front of me, some who turned lazily to gaze whoever dared interrupt – I decided to open my large mouth.

“I am so, so sorry Professor…” I huffed out, my chest like a balloon deflating. So dramatic. Just like that, he cut me off, waving a slim, three-fingered hand.

“What excuse have you concocted up this time, Brown?” He never called me by my first name, never ‘Ms Brown’ or ‘Miss Brown’. Never ‘human’ either, which I’d experienced on multiple occasions by other species. Whenever it was used, it was always used as a pejorative.

“I just got really absorbed in this homemade project – I’m growing a cut flower g-”

“Next,” he said loudly, clasping his hands behind his back and pacing, looking bored with me already.

“Well, I did get slightly lost because I was doing this project in-”

“Of the forty-eight sessions we have had so far, there have been exactly twenty-seven and a half excuses about ‘being lost.’ Unless you have a brain like a sieve, I suggest a well-detailed map. On your omni-tool. And perhaps lessons in geography.”

“Well that’s the thing, I took a wrong turn and fell down some stairs-”

“I suggest the optician – if you can find it of course,” he replied, caustic as ever. He tapped his omni-tool suddenly. “Uploading the coordinates to your map.” The class started sniggering.

“I scraped my knees,” I kept trying. It was like pushing syrup up a hill with a bloody tiny plastic freebie fork.

“First aid kit to your right – by the sink. Or did you want me to kiss it better as your mother always used to?” he said, half grinning this time.

It was hard to fight the small burst of blood that ran its way into my cheeks as the class openly laughed. I was astonished my body had betrayed me so, and my shoulders slumped, defeated. I was suddenly sad that I hadn’t the opportunity to further cajole him, or beat him at his own game. I huffily walked to my table and plonked myself on the uncomfortable stool, ignoring the sardonic glare of my lab partner.

That was it; my colleague and teacher was a salarian – there was no one-upping him. 

* * *

 

** Now **

He says to me; ‘Define love.’

How can one define a singular word? How can I explain to him that it wasn’t what the vids showed it was? Or the novels, or the extranet…His large eyes swallow me whole, patiently waiting for an answer. I shrivel like paper thrust into a flame.

“Love is, um, what you call it when….” My words shook; the foundation was shaky, about to collapse underneath is own flimsy weight. My hands sweat, clench together, wanting to float, thin as pollen, far away. Why is he so patient? My eyes water a little; I look at the ground, unable to find an answer for a mere moment. I exhale a long breath.

“It’s when you care for someone…more than you do yourself…”

He has to interrupt me, as if whatever I say is a moot point.

“Biology indicates that there is three major stages of love; libido, attachment and partner preference.”

He talks to me as if he knows humans better; as if biology can solve everything. As if biology is the be-all and end-all. As if science can explain everything…. I should know. I should know better. Do plants love? I eye the orchid in the background, suddenly loathing its mildness and apparent simplicity. 

Some of the basis of love is biological. We are no more than just biological beings. Or are we? If I were a poet, I’d write him a poem. If I were self-confident, I’d try to write one and give it to him anyway.

He leans over and for a wild, unabashed moment I think he might kiss me. I know it’s not love just yet; all I feel is infatuation. Is it infatuation? I loved once.

All he does is tap a photo-frame nonchalantly, one that belongs to me. A young love. A childhood sweetheart.

“It’s not just that,” I continue, ignoring what he said. “It’s when someone becomes…” Her voice shakes even more so, as I stare at the human in the photograph. My throat constricts, jaw tightens, so desperate to hold it all.

“A-a  _part_ of you….” He swivels his large eyes back to the photograph, wondering, forever wondering. 

He wants to know the details; somehow he thinks that perhaps explaining it, it will help me, lessen the pain. But it was a long time ago; the present is what hurts.

“When someone you love _dies_ …” Time glided slowly like a dream in that moment. I felt the tears sting and pearl on my cheeks.

Steadfast as the soul of truth; love cannot be defined.


End file.
